Pay now. Or pay with your life. Armed
and arrogant, a baby-faced teen named Honeyboy Willard
terrorizes hardened rumrunners until they agree to shell
out protection money. Soon Honeyboy and his underage
thugs, the Purple Gang, control Detroit, turning the
screws until local businessmen, driven to desperation,
call in the Chicago Mafia to outmuscle their homegrown
mob. Disarmingly boyish, Robert Blake (In
Cold Blood) makes a chilling Honeyboy, a
psychopath equally thrilled by luring a cop to his death
or cramming his best pal alive in a coffin, pouring in
cement, and dropping him in the river. “That’s the
way we work,” Honeyboy says. Bet on it.

NOTE: The Vertical axis represents the bits transferred
per second. The Horizontal is the time in minutes.

Bitrate

Audio

Dolby Digital Mono (English)

Subtitles

None

Features

Release
Information:
Studio: Warner Home Video

Aspect Ratio:
Widescreen anamorphic - 1.78:1

Edition Details:
• None

DVD Release Date:
July 12th, 2011Keep Case

Chapters 9

Comments

1959-1960
saw a number of biopics of Prohibition-era gangsters,
often very loosely based on facts.
Al Capone and
Legs Diamond already saw a DVD release from
Warner Archive Collection, so now comes Detroit-based
The Purple Gang. Released in 1959 by Allied Artists,
the film features Barry Sullivan as a police lieutenant
and Robert Blake as a leader of a gang, who can be
charming on one hand and a sociopathic killer on the
other.

While not
advertised as remastered, the progressive anamorphic
transfer from Warner Home Video is very strong on this
Made-on-demand release. There is very little damage on
the print and the contrast is strong. The English audio
is adequate, but per usual standard, there is no
subtitles or closed captioning. No extras are included.
A recommended release from Warner Archives.